Public service channel disappears from TV: This station is on the verge of extinction

• Deutsche Welle is preparing the end of its German-language TV program.
• However, the content should not disappear completely.
• The background to the measure is the assumption that 2024 will have to make do with a smaller budget.

As is well known, the foreign broadcaster Deutsche Welle is also represented in Germany with a German-language television program. However, the linear broadcast of this is now to be gradually phased out. The broadcaster justifies this with savings measures of a preventive nature, as it is assumed that from 2024 there will be less budget available.

In contrast to the other public broadcasters, Deutsche Welle does not obtain its funds from the broadcasting fee, but is provided with financial resources directly by the Bundestag. For example, 400 million euros in support was received for 2022, but not only does this have to finance the program in German, but above all the many foreign-language offers and branches and employees around the world.

Effort and use of the German TV program in blatant disproportion

The German-language offer of the TV station should live on in the digital world. According to DW director Peter Limbourg, the around 250,000 regular viewers (worldwide, mind you) are disproportionate to the effort put into the programme. In general, German content is not given top priority, as the company sees itself primarily as a foreign broadcaster for foreign-language viewers.

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Deutsche Welle did not say when exactly the linear distribution will be stopped. However, since this is about relatively timely budgets, one can assume that the withdrawal from classic television will be completed in the foreseeable future of perhaps only a few months.